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If the holidays resulted in a few extra inches to your waistline and you’re determined to get fit, a free half-marathon training program will kick-off in Jackson County in January.
The program culminates in Western Carolina University’s Valley of the Lilies Half Marathon & 5-K to be held March 25.
Group training runs for the half marathon will be held on campus at 6 a.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and at 8 a.m. on Saturdays, beginning Monday, Jan. 9.
In addition, all runners signed up for the half-marathon will get a free copy of a training plan developed by WCU’s athletic training faculty, with plans for both beginner and experienced runners. Experts in injury prevention, nutrition and health will provide information sessions and assistance to runners over the three-month training program as well.
The race:
The course will follow a scenic 13.1-mile journey through the WCU campus and along the Tuckasegee River. For runners looking for a shorter and faster option, race organizers have added a 5-K (3.1-mile) race and walk to this year’s activities.
Online registration for the half marathon and 5-K is available at active.com. Registration fees are $40 for the half marathon and $20 for the 5-K through Wednesday, Feb. 29. Beginning Thursday, March 1, the fees increase to $60 for the half marathon and $25 for the 5-K. No registration will be accepted after Wednesday, March 21, including on race day. halfmarathon.wcu.edu.
A program called “Land Ethics: Reconnecting with the Natural World” will be held at 6 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 12 at the Macon Library in Franklin.
The free program includes a short film that is based on conservationist Aldo Leopold’s visionary work and book, A Sand County Almanac. The book set the stage for the modern conservation movement when published in 1949.
Robert Hawk of the N.C. Cooperative Extension Service will lead the workshop.
Leopold believed in observation of the natural world through scientific inquiry and by engaging in purposeful work on the land — and by reflecting on that experience. “Together these activities can bring people to a new understanding and respect for the landscape around them,” Hawk said.
The program attempts to address ecological problems by giving participants a chance to “...see the land, to understand what he sees, and enjoy what he understands,” and to deepen their commitment to conservation and their communities.
828.586.4009.
Haywood Community College’s hard work to build a sustainable campus is featured on a campus sustainability case study database.
The National Wildlife Federation built the database, the only catalog of its kind, at ww.nwf.org/campuscasestudies. Work by other American colleges and universities also is available for review, with close to 100 new case studies added this year. The features include efforts to reduce pollution, waste and costs; including recycling, energy efficiency improvements, alternative transportation systems and green jobs training programs.
For 2011, Haywood Community College submitted a case study featuring a Sustainable Dining Experience. HCC uses compostable utensils, cups, napkins, and plates in the dining area.
Students, faculty and staff place compostable materials along with food waste into a designated composting bin within the dining area. The grounds team takes the compost to the school’s composting facility, where it is then composted to produce useable soil and associated compost material. The soil and compostable material is then brought to a horticulture organic garden plot to grow organic produce, which is then consumed in the dining area. All food that cannot be consumed is brought to Helping Hands in Haywood County to feed the needy.
In addition to the 2011 submissions, the database includes more than 600 case studies from campuses across the U.S. spanning more than a decade.
Bryan Wilder, a veteran state park ranger, has been promoted to superintendent of Mount Mitchell State Park.
Wilder takes over from Jack Bradley, who retired as superintendent earlier this year.
As superintendent, Wilder will function as the chief of operations and administration with responsibilities for staffing, training, law enforcement, visitor services, natural resource protection and environmental education.
“Bryan is well-versed in the unique challenges presented at Mount Mitchell, the oldest state park in our system and one of the oldest in the nation. His range of experience will help ensure the park’s leadership in conservation and tourism development,” said Lewis Ledford, state parks director.
A native of Kentucky, Wilder is a 1996 graduate of Morehead State University with a bachelor’s degree in environmental science and geography. Wilder worked with the soil conservation district in Clintwood, Va., with the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries and as a math and science teacher in Dickenson County, Va., before joining North Carolina’s state parks system in 2005 as a ranger at Mount Mitchell State Park.
Suzanne Raether will read from and sign her novel, Judaculla, Friday, at 7 p.m. on Jan.13 at City Lights Bookstore in Sylva.
Set in Jackson County, Judaculla tells the story of Timothy Fletcher, a 19-year-old WCU student athlete who discovers that he is actually the manifestation of an ancient mountain god.
“In her debut novel, Judaculla, Raether weaves story and poetry, myth and reality, the sacred and the profane, to create a spellbinding exploration of the fragile intersections between people and worlds. Fresh and original, compelling and utterly beguiling, Raether’s voice and talent are magic,” said Western North Carolina novelist Pam Duncan.
Michael Revere will present his poetry for the January “Coffee with the Poet” series at 10:30 a.m. on Jan. 19 at City Lights Bookstore.
He has written several books, including, War, Madness and Love, What Co$t Freedom, and an audio collection titled, Lizard Man.
The Coffee with the Poet series is a monthly gathering and meets every third Thursday.
828.586.9499.
Honor the troops who have fought in the war in Iraq by participating in a candlelight vigil on Friday, Dec. 30 at 5:30 p.m., below the steps to the Jackson County Public Library at the Veterans Memorial Fountain. The event will be postponed only if there is a serious snowstorm. This is a nonpartisan, single-issue event, commemorating the end of the long and deadly war in Iraq and showing gratitude for those who served, their families and those who are bringing the war to a close. If you have a candle in a votive holder, please bring it This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
A vigil honiring the return of troops from Iraq will also be held in Swain County at 5:30 p.m. on Dec. 31 at the historic courthouse.MedWest Health System is sponsoring “Man to Man” support group meetings for prostate cancer patients and survivors. The meetings are from 7-8 p.m. the second Monday of the month in the Annex Conference Room on the MedWest-Harris campus in Sylva. “Man to Man” is an American Cancer Society support group.
Meetings are free. 828.631.8100.
Beginner judo classes in Waynesville start Jan. 3 through the Waynesville Kodokan Judo Club. The club practices at the Waynesville Recreation Center on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 4 to 7 p.m. Children participate from 4 to 5:30 p.m. and adults participate from 5:30 to 7 p.m. This is open to boys and girls of all ages.
The Waynesville Kodokan Judo Club has competed in several tournaments this year, winning more than 100 medals and trophies.
828.506.0327.
Smokey Mountain Elementary seventh-grade students will help the Tye Blanton Foundation through their “Service to Others” project.
Tye, who died after a four-and-a-half month battle in Neo-natal ICU, was the son of slain Highway Patrol Trooper Shawn Blanton and his wife, Michaela.
Smokey Mountain students and their families collected clothing and other items that would be used for premature babies and their families at Mission Hospital’s Neonatal Intensive Care. The school is also planning a blood drive in memory of Trooper Blanton, who was a student there. www.tyeblanton.com.
The Smoky Mountain News takes note this week of some of the newsmakers of 2011 by handing out our annual awards.
Back issues of the newspaper never fail to reveal a variety of humdingers: the funny, the astonishing, the interesting, the dismaying. Some we’d like to forget, others we hope to see repeated for the good laughs.
For those who made the list, hats off to you for giving us something to write about this year, even if you could do without the award bestowed upon you. For those who didn’t, there’s always 2012.
Epic fail award
Maybe there’s no connection, but did anyone else notice the timing involved in the arrest of a Western Carolina University student on charges he used a toy gun to rob a bank across the street from campus in Cullowhee? The robbery came just days after of an announcement that WCU would institute a $399 tuition and fees hike. The kid had just that day been evicted from his apartment, too.
When police searched the apartment, they found the toy gun and the money — someone clearly hadn’t watched enough bank heist movies.
The Captive audience award
To the graduation speaker for Nantahala School in Macon County, a cowboy preacher who tied up and blindfolded a student volunteer with ropes to make various points about the devil and sin.
This bizarre graduation spectacle was punctuated by the preacher’s fire and brimstones sermon, all clearly and obviously and indisputably in violation of the separation of church and state to so overtly push religion in a school setting. Though Macon School Superintendent Dan Brigman initially defended the speech, he retreated from that stance when faced with a possible lawsuit with Freedom From Religion Foundation.
LeBron James award
Haywood County commissioners borrowed LeBron’s mantra when they decided to sell out the county’s landfill — kicking the home team to the curb for a chance at greatness.
The county turned over the keys to its landfill to a private, for-profit company. That company gets to sell off space in the landfill to other places looking for somewhere to dump their trash — interestingly, it gets to keep the money made off selling space in Haywood’s landfill. Meanwhile, the company also gets a flat monthly fee for accepting the county’s own trash.
Why would Haywood sell out for such a raw deal? Haywood County won’t have to worry about replacing its aging fleet of landfill equipment or the cost of expanding the pit at the landfill in the future. It also won’t have to worry about the large expense three or four decades from now to close out the landfill when it finally fills up.
Despite allowing a private company to sell off space in the county’s landfill for a profit — something that could double or triple the daily volume of trash coming in — it won’t fill up any sooner than the 40-year life it was previously projected to have when being used only for Haywood’s own trash.
Maybe they should get the “fuzzy math” award instead?
99 percent award
There were no tents or campouts or long-lived protests for Occupy Sylva, who might better be dubbed Occupy Lulu’s restaurant. Participants, mainly aging Democrats, rallied gamely one Saturday morning in October for an entire hour around the courthouse fountain on Main Street in Sylva before retiring into various downtown restaurants to do lunch.
The Occupy Sylva hour has given birth to Occupy WNC, which meets in the cozy warmth of a county government courtroom on Tuesday evenings.
One percent award
How does an annual salary and benefits of $185,000 sound? That’s what the principal chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians makes, not counting a car. But a challenger for the chief’s seat this year, Patrick Lambert, was willing to give up his own salary and benefits worth $446,000 annually as the director of the Tribal Gaming Commission for the honor of serving as the tribe’s leader.
Lambert’s salary at the Gaming Commission became public in the final weeks of the election. The big salary was justified as being commiserate with other top jobs in the casino industry compared to government service.
Dust Bowl award
Granted, there won’t be any problem finding parking, but it sure promises to be lonely in Franklin’s largest strip mall when Walmart moves a few miles away to a new location. A few of the strip mall’s businesses are joining the exodus and following in the footsteps of the retail giant, but the rest are apparently left high and dry with an empty, hulking shell next door.
Walmart is planning a spring opening at its new location. The eight or so businesses left might consider planning a wake for about the same time.
Best idea
When Walmart abandoned its former store in Haywood County for newer, bigger digs across town, it left a hulking shell in its wake and a desolate strip mall with a shaky future. Haywood County commissioners, meanwhile, had been passing the buck for years on what to do about the antiquated Department of Social Services building, where 200 employees has been putting up with leaky roofs, frozen pipes, and quarters so cramped that closets had been converted into offices.
Haywood County bought the old Walmart building and repurposed it to house DSS and the health department and county planning offices, for a total cost of $12 million — breathing new life into the strip mall and saving taxpayers millions compared to the cost of a brand-new facility.
Super Bowl award
Despite the hype, the hard-fought road to victory and the tears along the way, the game itself is always surprisingly anticlimactic — which Webster’s defines as “lacking climax, disappointing or ironically insignificant following impressive foreshadowing.”
That pretty well sums up the first chunk of change Swain County spent from its North Shore Road settlement fund. After nearly 65 years of bitter fighting, Swain County got a $12.5 million federal payout to compensate the county for a 30-mile road flooded by the creation of Fontana Lake.
The money was put in a lockbox except for the annual interest it accrues. The county’s first move when that first interest payment came through? Five commemorative granite pedestals in front of the county administration building honoring the key players in the fight.
The most charettes
It’s a little known word in most circles, except in Waynesville, where it’s right up there with baseball and apple pie. A forum for public input, charettes bring stakeholders to the table to collect their ideas and visions.
When it came time to replace its long-time town manager, Waynesville spent $20,000 on a consultant to steer the process and hold charettes — five of them in all, including an on-going written comment period — to find out what characteristics and qualities the community wants to see in a new town manager.
Quick to trot out a charette no matter the occasion, Waynesville has held community visioning meetings on everything from a new skateboard park to sidewalk priorities, along with the more standard public input fare of zoning and road building.
Gaffe of the year
It seems like Marketing 101, but if your company is engaged in a turf war for Haywood County’s health care dollars, you probably should not do an impression of your “best Haywood County accent” at a national conference of hospital marketing professionals. But that’s exactly what Janet Moore, the former marketing director of Mission Hospital did — a misstep that ultimately cost Moore her job when an audio recording from the conference was leaked. Her comedic interlude also referenced the poor dental hygiene, fightin’ roosters and sofas on the porch of people living in the “hollers” of Haywood County. Backlash over the comments prompted Mission’s CEO to have a sit down with Haywood County leaders to apologize.
McClellan award
Following in the footsteps of Union General George McClellan’s famous retreat in the Civil War, the Haywood County Tourism Development Authority knew when it was licked.
Outnumbered by festival organizers and town leaders, the board backed away from its threat to cut funding for long-running, signature events in the county and redirect it to start-up festivals instead. The loss of funding could have dealt a devastating blow to annual favorites such as Church Street Festival, International Festival Day, Waynesville street dances and Canton’s Labor Day Festival — although it would have arguably given new festivals a chance to burst onto the scene.
Backlash led to a castrated version of the guidelines that instead merely suggests new events should be given priority over established ones — but did not unequivocally halt funding for the old standards.
Friends in high places award
What’s the best way to get a building named after you? Just ask Conrad Burrell, who used his position on the powerful Department of Transportation Board to land $12 million to build a road to the doorstep of a new building on the campus of Southwestern Community College in Sylva. Burrell also sat on SCC’s Board of Trustees, and ultimately the new building was named in his honor.
Public service award
Danya VanHook of Maggie Valley gets an “A” for effort when it comes to her desire to serve in office. Twice in two years, VanHook put her name in the ring to serve in a public capacity when elected seats were vacated mid-term: once as a District Court judge and later as a Maggie Valley alderman. Both times she secured an appointment to the seat, but when it came time to officially run with her name on the ballot, she lost the election.
Duct tape award
Canton has been holding its aging swimming pool with everything short of duct tape and bailing wire, but the annual patch job has finally gone down the drain. The town needs to come up with just shy of $1 million to completely rebuild its pool in the next few years — money that has so far proved elusive for the small town to come by.
Lewis and Clark award
Eureka! The National Park Service has finally discovered that part of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park lies in North Carolina — more than half of it in fact, and the prettier parts if we dare say so ourselves.
More than 75 years after the park was created, the National Park Service has finally opened an official visitors center on the North Carolina side of the park. Of course, it was paid for entirely by private donations from the nonprofit Great Smoky Mountains Association and Friends of the Smokies, but hey, we’ll take what we can get.
Main Street duel award
Tourists now have their pick of literature when it comes to travel brochures on Haywood County thanks to two visitor centers operating just two blocks away from each other. The Haywood County Tourism Development Authority opened a new visitor center in downtown Waynesville this year down the street from an existing one operated by the Haywood County Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber used to enjoy a financial support from the tourism agency for its visitor center, but that has been scaled back now that the tourism agency has opted to open a visitor center of its own.
The Stickup award
If you can’t get a loan, just ask for cold, hard cash instead. That seems to be the answer for the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad, which wants some half million in taxpayer dollars to bring a steam engine to Dillsboro. The engine is in Maine, and it costs a pretty penny to get it down here. Seem crazy? Some of Jackson County’s leaders don’t think so — in return for that seductive promise of jobs and economic good times for the tourist train, they seem willing to try to work with the cash-strapped railroad, whose owner, Al Harper, was involved in the Ghost Town in the Sky old-West theme park in Maggie that went bankrupt.
Banana peel award
After six wrecks happened in the same spot on Interstate 40 during an early morning dusting last winter, the truth came out: there was a stretch of no-man’s land on the Haywood and Buncombe county line when it came to snowplowing detail.
Plows and salt trucks coming from opposite directions — one crew from Haywood and another from Buncombe — use exit 37 as a natural turn-around point before heading back the other way. But a few hundred yards of Interstate between the exit ramp and on ramp weren’t hit with the same regularity as the rest of the Interstate, since it meant trucks had to overshoot their mark and go all the way to the next exit before doubling back. The plow crews in neighboring counties lacked a formal policy for who would do the bothersome spot — at least until this article hit the fan.
Field of Dreams award
Swain County firmly believed in the saying “build it and they will come.” Unfortunately, it didn’t quite pan out like the movie. When Swain spent $10 million to build a jail four times bigger than it needed to house its own prisoners, it hoped to make money housing prisoners from other counties. But other counties, it seemed, had jails of their own in the works at the same time, and taxpayers are stuck paying a 40-year loan on the oversized jail without a revenue stream to offset it.
A final nail in the coffin came this year, when the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians — the only steady supplier of outside inmates who will pay to bunk up in Swain’s jail — broke ground on a jail of their own as well.
The Head in the Sand award
The town of Bryson City has been through plenty this year regarding its volunteer fire department after the State Bureau of Investigation launched a probe into financial handlings under the former fire chief.
Meanwhile, an investigation by The Smoky Mountain News found that town officials felt something was amiss for years but did nothing about it. Rather than demand the department’s financial records, town leaders stuck their head in the sand and ignored talk about alleged misuse of donations until a whistleblower inside the department took his concerns to police detectives.
Why the blind eye? The town donned kid gloves when it came to the fire department financials because the fire chief threatened to strike if posed with uncomfortable money questions.
Bachmann, Perry & Cain award
Their epic rise and fall, and the blight left in their wake, is all too familiar in Sylva where a daily reminder of a similar crash-and-burn phenomenon has become part of the landscape. Known these days as the Ghostel, a partly-finished four-story hotel towers over the main thoroughfare as a shadowy reminder of the great real estate hey-day gone by.
Developers of what was supposed to be a four-story Clarion Inn went bankrupt before the project was finished. And much like these failed Republican presidential primary candidates, a wake of supporters were left high and dry. The contractor claims he was never paid fully for the work he did. The bank foreclosed but so far can’t unload the shell to anyone else. And the town is still casting about for a replacement, someone to come in and fill the shoes of the empty void left behind.
Bob Barker award
New owners of the troubled Wildflower subdivision in Macon County realized Bob Barker was on to something with the “Price is Right.” Prices on lots were slashed, giving rise to a rebirth and reincarnation of the beleaguered development, renamed The Ridges.
Dozens of lots were sold at rock-bottom prices, marking the first significant movement in Macon County’s troubled land market since the economy crashed — even if it was at a fraction of the price.
World Record for Grand Openings
Ask anyone in Canton when the Imperial Hotel is supposed to open, and you’ll get a myriad of dates — past, present and future.
Former Mayor Pat Smathers has owned the historic hotel on Main Street for more than 20 years and has been renovating it since the 1990s. The initial opening date in May of this year turned into July, then August, and the latest target being New Year’s Eve only days away. But, will it actually open? Or will that have to wait for another year?
No matter what Smathers must open by November 2012 or pay the piper. If he does not create 15 jobs by November, he will be forced to repay the $90,000 economic development grant he received from the state.
Bottomless Pit award
“Mo Money Mo Problems” by rapper Notorious B.I.G. seems to be the Maggie Valley Fairgrounds theme song.
During the past six years, Maggie has blown through two festival directors and upwards of $1 million on an enterprise that only seems to lose money. This year, the town lost more than $50,000 putting on the two taxpayer-funded events — Red, White and Boom and the Americana Roots and Beer festival.
However, the town seemed bound and determined to throw cash at the fairground’s problems until they disappear, putting their hopes in motorcycle rallies and craft shows to pull the valley out of a tourism tailspin.
Now, it’s just a game of wait and see if the new regime elected to town hall will make good on their campaign promises to cut back fairgrounds spending or if more tax money will find itself blowing in the wind.
The ‘E’ for Effort Award
Considerable excitement swelled around the installation of the Wave Shaper on the Nantahala River this year but the initial response from resident kayakers was that the Wave fell flat.
The verdict: the $300,000 underwater mechanism that kicks up surf for paddlers to perform tricks and stunts on, still needs tuning. During the official unveiling in December, The Wave created only a small pocket for kayakers to show their stuff, and several were impeded by the contraption’s concrete ledge while attempting tricks. Reactions to The Wave ranged for “It’s ok” to “I liked the old wave better.”
Project leaders pledge to hone The Wave and will eventually get it right, but they still have some work to do before the 2012 World Cup of Freestyle Kayaking and the 2013 World Freestyle Kayaking Championship.
Gertrude Stein award
A rose is a rose is a rose — but can tulips and daffodils save Maggie Valley’s wilting tourism trade? In an attempt to improve its streetscape and attract more visitors, Maggie Valley leaders launched a plan to give the town a little color with a four-season show of flowers along its five-lane drag. The town invested several thousand dollars and rallied business owner to dig in and plant bulbs as well to beautify town. It remains to be seen if the idea will bear fruit.
Fight Club award
Jackson County sparked a brouhaha when it petitioned the Department of Transportation for its own ‘This way to Cherokee’ sign, saying the highway through Jackson County is the safer, faster and best route for tourists in search of casino action. Currently, the lone roadside sign pointing the way to Cherokee shunts the traveling public off the highway and through Maggie Valley, a winding, two-lane route over Soco Gap.
Jackson County leaders were hoping Waynesville would get their back in their bid for a second sign, since Waynesville would presumably benefit as well from Cherokee-bound travelers passing by their doorstep instead veering off through Maggie.
But Waynesville wasn’t immediately down with the tag-team format, wavering on whether to throw in with Jackson County or proclaim its loyalty to Maggie Valley as a fellow Haywood County compatriot.
The Claiming Credit Where It Ain’t Due award
In a power play as audacious and brazen as any that has occurred in recent local political history, a bronze plaque for the new Jackson County Public Library was hijacked by newly elected county commissioners hoping to share in the moment of glory.
When the new commissioners took office, a plaque had already been ordered, per custom in Western North Carolina, featuring the names of the five commissioners who shepherded in the $8 million library project. By the time the ribbon cutting rolled around, however, three of them had since lost their seats. A change in wording was sent to the plaque company asking for the names of the three newly-elected commissioner to be added. Ironically, the new commissioners vying for a spot on the plaque had questioned the price tag of the library during the campaign.
Stay tuned on this one — after the uproar, no plaque has appeared at all. A cardboard replica of the plaque-to-be still hangs in the library’s foyer, tucked away in an obscure corner.
The Maverick award
OK, we finally believe it — Jackson County Chairman Jack Debnam is not simply a Republican in sheep’s clothing, despite receiving GOP funding and support during the last election. He’s actually a member of the local Cowboy Party, made up of just Debnam. This cowboy has been shooting from the hip since taking over the top spot in a unique, take-no-prisoners style of his very own.
Debnam has supported a referendum on alcohol sales in Jackson County though he’s a nondrinker. He received heavy support in the election from the Cashiers area, but he’s openly advocated for a single tourism entity in Jackson County instead of the current model that gives Cashiers autonomy over its own cut of tourism tax dollars, to the chagrin of his Cashiers supporters.
And despite backing from county development interests, Debnam even embarked on a one-man war with the state’s Department of Transportation, questioning a waste of taxpayer dollars on environmentally-destructive road projects.
What’s next in the O.K. Corral? Who knows, not with Debnam in charge of this wacky wagon train.
The Big Baby award
When N.C. Rep. Mitch Gillespie, R-Marion, didn’t get his way to score a Right to Life license plate for car bumpers, he got even. He pushed through changes to the state’s specialty license plates that will strip the attractive designs of wildly-popular specialty plates for groups like Friends of the Smokies, the Appalachian Trail, the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation and others.
The extra fee for the specialty plates benefits the groups involved and the state. Last year alone, the sale of specialty plates raised $385,000 for Friends of the Smokies, helping to pay for the elk reintroduction project, trail building, black bear studies and similar initiatives.
Unless the pendulum swings back, starting in 2015 all plates will have to abide by the (dare we call it dull) state-approved template. The new law will gut the attractive full-color specialty plate designs and instead relegate a logo to one corner, leaving plate numbers easily seen and the state of origin easy to ascertain.
The Good Morning, Vietnam award
We love you, man, we really do. And we support environmental protections, too. But the idea of waking up each morning to an anti-fracking report, daily ozone update or latest anti-Duke Energy rant over the air is perhaps more radical than even Jackson County’s leftist ranks can handle. But if Avram Friedman, director of the Canary Coalition, succeeds in his bid for an FM radio station license, get ready for some unadulterated, uncut, uncensored, parental-advisory-recommended environmental programming.
Rally the Troops award
To administrators at community colleges, who brought immense local political pressures to bear when the state proposed a cost-savings plan to consolidate 15 of the state’s smallest community colleges, mergers that would target Haywood Community College and Southwestern Community College.
Community colleges would lose their autonomy and local responsiveness — taking the “community” out of community colleges, so the argument went — for savings of a measly $5 million a year. Lost in the arguments was this salient fact: the administrators leading the charge were at risk of seeing their jobs lost in the merger.
The Get Real award
To Macon County commissioners, who at regular intervals over the past two decades have given the planning board a green light to draft a land-use plan, only to reject each plan the planning board presents.
The latest planning train crash involved the Macon County Planning Board’s futile attempts to institute steep-slope regulations, an effort that broke down into open warfare on the planning board. In order to salvage some scraps of the steep slope rules, the ordinance as a whole was shelved save a few of the least egregious parts, which were cherry picked out and repackaged as “construction guidelines” — but even they still haven’t received commissioners’ support.
We have a novel idea — why not just get real and dissolve the planning board in Macon County? Give those poor folks a break from writing ordinances that don’t see the light of day.
The Duking it Out award
To Susan Ervin and Lamar Sprinkle, who dressed up otherwise long and tedious planning board meetings this year by openly spatting and sniping at each other. This made for much more exciting news from the meetings than would otherwise have been the case, and we and our readers thank the Macon County commissioners for their brilliant decision to add Sprinkle — who is open and non-apologetic about his overall anti-planning stance — onto the planning board in the name of “balance.”
Perhaps, in the same spirit, commissioners should consider placing anti-development forces on the Economic Development Commission, pot smokers on the county’s drug task force and parents who oppose vaccinating their children onto the county’s health department board.
No shame award
So let’s get this straight: Western Carolina University has hired its fourth football coach in 10 years — after running off the last three for losing too much — in hopes of buying itself some wins on the field. This time, however, the university is taking a new approach. If you can’t beat ‘em, hire ‘em … the latest WCU football coach is from Appalachian State University, which has smushed the Catamounts for, well, ever. We suggest recruiting some of ASU’s football players, too, while you’re at it.
While reading the article “Getting ready: Growing number of preppers work to ensure survival in case of societal collapse” (Dec. 7 edition, www.smokymountainnews.com/news/item/5738) in a recent edition of The Smoky Mountain News, I paused often to really think about what the growth of this industry says about our cohesion as a local, national and global community. After working as a farmer progressing towards sustainability, and participating in many grassroots political endeavors, I have learned first-hand about preparing for a loss of state and corporate provided resources.
Being physically prepared for this potential crisis is smart, not paranoid, and I support it. However, I feel that often another — and the most important — aspect of sustainability, a strong community, is completely overlooked.
I know a part of the article did focus on Troy Leatherwood’s approach to this industry via working “to form a community of like-minded individuals,” and I champion thoughtfully planned small neighborhoods. This is not what I am speaking, for this is a business concept.
What I endeavor to promote in my own day-to-day living and what I believe to be a real solution is greater connection with the people I inhabit this area with. If the proverbial “Armageddon” comes, weeks or months’ worth of potable water and freeze-dried food will not save you, or your society. It will only prolong the inevitable clash of “haves and have nots” and the possible unraveling of humanity.
We can subvert this possible future if we work here, now, to create a greater awareness of our environment, of our surroundings, by building bridges with our neighbors, whoever they are. Then I believe we provide a real infrastructure to replace the illusion of the one we have now, one that can collapse by forces outside our control and/or our ability to effect. By reaching out to know each other more we replace fear with understanding; difference with commonality. And, we match skills and resources too. For example, I can grow some food to trade you for your ability to fix my car, and so on.
I believe community to be a core ingredient in humanity. I also believe that the forces which control the resource flow work in tandem with the ones which coerce the culture flow. For a long time now they have both been providing a less-than-sustainable community and country. The reality of them though is that they are not absolute, and just as easily as you can buy evaporated milk for when the milk trucks stop running, you probably can make a friend or acquaintance who has goats or cows.
Curt Collins
Avant Garden Farm and Venue
Cullowhee
To the Editor:
To all 99 percenters. You had better be paying attention to what Newt Gingrich and his cronies are proposing for the future of your country. Get informed about what is being thrown out there. Then, get involved! You matter and your vote matters come next November.
Don’t think it’s too early. The Republicans and Tea Partiers are not waiting to take control of your lives. They already have a good foothold. You may not agree with all that your President has done, but don’t forget what has been accomplished.
If the Republicans were selling the President they would say that he is: the guy who stopped 400,000 jobs from leaving the country; the guy who saved the auto industry; the guy who got rid of ‘Don’t ask. Don’t tell and … Osama Bin Laden. And he had to fight every step of the way to get anything done. They would be selling a successful three years.
Get up, get involved and let your voice be heard. You all know constituents who believe as you do. Find out where the meetings are, volunteer, make phone calls. Believe that your president is leading us forward. This is your New Year’s resolution.
Joan Palmroos
Otto
To the Editor:
We find ourselves during the holidays celebrating the birth of a man whose teaching greatly affected our present-day social contract. He taught us to be tolerant towards each and every one and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. He taught us to care for the poor in spirit, the meek, and the hungry and thirsty. He taught us to show mercy. He taught that blessed are the peace makers and the pure in heart. He taught us to not bear false witness. He taught us that it will be harder for a rich man to enter heaven.
When it will win votes for the conservative economic and political agenda, the conservative members of Congress, media sources, blogs, the Tea Party, large banks and corporations, and extremely wealthy men such as the Koch brothers and Mr. Art Pope (of North Carolina) claim that “we are a Christian nation.” But what teachings of this celebrated man are actually practiced by their actions?
It seems like the Republicans in Congress pledge allegiance to the rich man’s desire for no new taxes above their pledge of allegiance to United States of America. While Democrats strive for compromise, the Republicans have vowed to make our President fail even as it means that our government “by and for the people” shall fail. They are hell bent on destroying the United States government as we know it. These same intentions prevail on the state and county level with even more devastating effect.
The right’s tremendous wealth will again finance an extreme agenda. Capitalism is now on steroids. Because of the conservative Supreme Court justices, not only are corporations defined as “people” but they can also give vast sums of unaccountable money to spread lies and distortions. Their very generous tax breaks for more than 10 years have allowed them to accumulate tremendous wealth that does not create jobs but sits in financial growth instruments such as derivatives, the rich man’s version of a casino. Even one of the top Republican candidates for President is a lobbyist in everything but legal terminology. If they win, everything will be for sale in America. It is obvious that the wealthiest among us and the right-wing extremists are not interested in the living conditions of their fellow citizens — unless they can make a buck.
It is time for Haywood Democrats to mobilize. We may not have their wealth, their media, their propensity for half-truths and lies, but we do have our numbers, the truth and our organizational skills. The 2012 election is extremely important if we wish to save our country from corporate greed and maintain social contracts that help the elderly, young, women, unemployed, the sick, and the retired.
As a Democrat, make your first New Year’s resolution to support the efforts of Haywood Democratic Party with your time, money, your community connections, and volunteering. As an independent, make your first New Year’s resolution to get to the facts and ignore their attempts to spin the truth. The very essence of our government of “we the people” and the social contracts that bind us together at the federal, state and county level, hangs in the balance.
John S. Geers
Haywood County
To the Editor:
I think that clear-cutting the slope on Russ Avenue across the road from Kmart was ridiculous. I understand that they needed soil for the contaminated apple orchard, but they could not have chosen a worse place to do so.
First of all, tourism is one of Waynesville’s main source of income. Why do tourists come to Waynesville? They come to look at the trees. They do not come to look at demolished hillsides. The company that bought the plot of land for the dirt could not have chosen a worse spot. When tourists flood into Waynesville via Russ Avenue every year, then they all get to see the eyesore of a slope. It baffles me why the city is so intent on beautifying the city by having strict rules with businesses and what seems like no rules on keeping the environment pleasing to the eye in town.
I would be much more concerned about how the town actually looks than whether a parking lot should be in the front or the back of a business. The company could of at least chosen a spot where the mass public was not going to see it. They could have also chosen a spot where there were no trees so they did not have to cut any down. The operation, being on Russ Avenue with its already congested traffic, was unsafe, not environmentally-friendly, and is still an eyesore to everybody. If we want a successful town, it would be best not to make the same mistake again.
Zachary Perkins
Waynesville
To the Editor:
As I bounce merrily along the potholes on the way into town, I often wonder if the money spent on pubic displays of artwork could have been better spent in these trying economic times.
I may be in the minority on this, but the artwork next to the new Waynesville police station has never captured my imagination. After the article by Caitlin Bowling in The Smoky Mountain News (Dec. 14 issue, www.smokymountainnews.com/news/item/5803) suggested the movement of the artwork by the town, my thoughts were not of the best location but why more money is being spent on projects of less priority to the city and its residents.
When it comes to matters of subjectivity like artwork, my mother says, “If you like it, chances are, most other people will.” The same idea works in reverse. No offense to Mr. Trapp, but I feel that the bright, multi-colored whirlygig sharply contrasts with the Waynesville’s historic earth tones of wood and brick.
I have no problem with works of public art, as I see the oversized bluegrass players down on Miller Street to be perfectly suited for its location and the subject matter fits neatly with our local heritage.
If the city is concerned about its appearance to tourists, may I suggest that our hard-earned tax dollars go to more immediate repairs of the town’s infrastructure. How can visitors appreciate the beauty of our county, along with the multiculturalism of Folkmoot, if they have to first endure the site of rundown buildings, cracked sidewalks, and damaged roadways? In my humble opinion, these types of investments are key to the future going forward into a decade of uncertain financial times. I hope and pray the commission will think long and hard while considering the wise use of taxpayer monies when they reconvene in January.
James Monday
Waynesville
Landscape painter Jack Stern will demonstrate oil painting techniques at 6:15 p.m. on Jan. 5 at the Swain County Center for the Arts in Bryson City.
He will discuss the medium of oil painting and how to develop the painting from concept to finished artwork as he completes a landscape painting for the Art League of the Smokies.
Stern specializes in oil, acrylic and watercolor paintings of the Smoky Mountains and the Rocky Mountains.
The demonstration is free and sponsored by the North Carolina Arts Council, Swain County Center for the Arts and Swain County Schools.
Stern began painting in oils when he was 14 years old and started formal art classes soon after in San Diego. At 16, he sold his first painting.
Stern currently lives with his wife Peggy in a remote cabin in Tuckasegee near the Black Balsam Mountains, where they moved with their two sons more than 12 years ago.
During the years, Stern has received numerous honors and awards, most recently including the “Award of Distinction” in 2011 from Art in the Park Juried Show in Blowing Rock, North Carolina.
828.488.7843.
The Jackson County Public Library in downtown Sylva hosts a daytime music program on the first Friday of every month featuring the “The Lady and the Old Timers Band.”
Next month’s performance will be held from 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Jan. 6 at the library. The Lady and the Old Timers Band is composed of one lady and seven self-described old timers, five of whom are over 80 years old. They play gospel and traditional country tunes.
Members include vocalist Delia Sears along with Fred Kirkland, Jim Hite, and Jim Brown on guitar; Carl Sears on bass; “Wild Bill” Jackson on harmonica; Robert Bradley on mandolin; and Roy Ramsey on dobro.
828.586.2016.
Actress Barbara Bates Smith will perform her adaptation of the Lee Smith short story, “The Happy Memories Club,” at 2 p.m., Jan. 9, at the Haywood County Recreation and Parks building.
Following the performance, Dr. Lisa Verges will facilitate a discussion on the importance of knowing and sharing our own stories. The program is free and open to the public.
Smith is an actress who tours with a number of one-woman shows and has played at Haywood Arts Regional Theatre in “Wit, “Doubt,” “Hamlet” and “Three Tall Women.” Verges is a geriatric psychiatrist.
“The Happy Memories Club” features a retirement center resident about to be kicked out of her writing club.
The story recently provided a model for a series of “Our Own Stories” workshops led by Smith. Another such series is pending as a follow-up in partnership with the recently opened BrainGym program series. The address of the center for the one-hour program is 81 Elmwood Way in Waynesville.
828.452.6789.
The Jackson County Public Library in Sylva will host fiber artist Jerry Spears for a demonstration of traditional rug hooking at 7 p.m. on Jan. 10 in its atrium.
The rug is Spears’ palette choice. She creates her own designs and dyes her own wool fabric.
Spears has been involved in rug hooking for 12 years and has studied under many rug hooking professionals. Upon retirement from the rural electric cooperative industry, she started her rug hooking business, called Wool Junction and sells rug hooking supplies and patterns at national fiber shows as well as regional events.
Jerry and her husband, Ray, moved to Sylva in June, coming from Fairfax County, Va. Her parents and sister also live in Sylva.
She says the friendliness of the people in Western North Carolina and the slower pace of life drew her and her husband to the area.
The event will be a demonstration session, with samples of Spears’ work and tools on display. She will talk about the craft of rug hooking and take questions from the audience as she works. She will offer a hands-on class on rug hooking at 7 p.m. on Jan. 31 at the library. The fee is $25 and includes the use of tools and all materials to complete a small project.
The Jan. 10 demonstration is free and open to the public.
To register for the class, call the library.
828.586.2016.
The Marianna Black Library in Bryson City will show another family classic at 3:30 p.m., Jan. 3.
The 2011 movie from Walt Disney features beloved characters — Kanga, Roo, Piglet, Eeyore, Tigger and Pooh.
Christopher Robin has gone missing, and a mysterious creature known as a “Backson” seems to have taken him. The residents in the Hundred Acre Wood must figure out what truly happened. John Cleese, of Monty Python fame, narrates.
The library plays a different movie every Tuesday of the month and gives away one free movie check out voucher to each person who attends the movie. The movies are free to the public and projected onto an 8-by-10-foot screen, with a theater sound system.
Popcorn will be served in the library auditorium starting at 3:20 p.m.
828.488.3030
The First Thursday Old-Time and Bluegrass Jam Series will continue at Western Carolina University’s Mountain Heritage Center on Jan. 5 with a concert featuring Ric Ledford and Reems Creek Incident.
The 7 p.m. performance by the Buncombe County band will be followed by an 8 p.m. jam session, in which local musicians are invited to participate.
Playing a blend of traditional and contemporary bluegrass, Ric Ledford and Reems Creek Incident includes Ric Ledford on guitar and lead vocals, Jody Wood on banjo and harmony vocals, Russell Roe on mandolin and harmony vocals, and Travis Gentry on the bass.
The concerts and jam sessions will continue at the Mountain Heritage Center through the winter, with programs from 7 to 9 p.m. on the first Thursday of each month. The lineup of upcoming performers includes the New Southern Ramblers.
The events are free. Pickers and singers of all ages and experience levels are invited to take part in the jam sessions, and the events also are open to those who just want to listen.
The Mountain Heritage Center is located on the ground floor of WCU’s H.F. Robinson Administration Building.
828.227.7129.
The Gateway Club in Waynesville will hold a New Year’s Eve party on Dec. 31 in its dining room.
The party runs from 9:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m., with live music from the Lorraine Conard Trio, hors d’oeuvres and a champagne toast at midnight.
Tickets are limited and can be purchased at the front desk of the Gateway Club. The cost of entry is $20 per person for members and $25 a person for non-members.
The Gateway Club, which is located on Church Street in downtown Waynesville, will also be open for regular dinner service.
828.456.6789.
The North Carolina Humanities Council, a statewide nonprofit and affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities, has awarded $57,486 in grants for projects in the humanities. All funded programs are free and open to the public.
The Mountain Area Information Network (MAIN) of Asheville will receive $7,000 for the fifth annual Asheville Wordfest, a multicultural poetry festival presented in collaboration with Grateful Steps Publishing House and Bookshop and the YMI Cultural Center.
On May 3-5, 2012, poets and citizen-journalists from varied cultural backgrounds will explore the theme of home. Festival programming includes workshops in Geopoetics, Imaginature children’s events, film showings and the presentation of The Elumenati Dome. Wordfest’s poetry readings are webcast live and archived in an online video library.
Fontana Village Resort is planning its annual New Year’s Eve celebration in the Smokies.
The 2011 New Year’s Eve Bash includes dinner by Chef Carl Eklund in the Mountview Restaurant, a party with live music from the Caribbean Cowboys at the Fontana Events Hall, and fireworks on the village green at midnight to ring in the New Year.
Guests visiting the mountains and local residents should booking their reservations early for the Saturday night holiday event. Special pricing is available when you book two-night in a lodge room and cabin. The resort is also offering a party package that includes dinner, admission to the New Year’s Eve Bash with fireworks and a Sunday morning breakfast buffet at the Mountview Restaurant.
828.498.2211 or www.fontanavillage.com.
At Haywood Community College’s Regional High Technology Center, students created a Christmas tree like no other — a high-tech tree.
All the programs in the Advanced Technology Department made decorations for the tree, which uses LED energy efficient lights. The tree is decorated with everything from roofing tacks strung as garland to machined ornaments, stars cut from wood and eight “tinny” reindeer.
As part of an assignment, the students built Santa driving a sled led by a reindeer. Using Lego building blocks to construct the bodies, students also programmed the ‘robots’ to detect when someone is within two feet. Then, the reindeer and Santa move the sleigh.
“While it seems very simple, it is really a complex example of programming,” said electronic engineering student Robert Staggs. “We learned several aspects of robotics to complete this. We used a combination of sensors, timers and moving parts to get the end result.”
828.627.4631.
Gov. Beverly Purdue of North Carolina recently issued a proclamation officially declaring April 28 “Save the Frogs Day” in the state of North Carolina.
The governor’s move was prompted by the request of 13-year-old Rachel Hopkins, an eighth-grade student at Ravenscroft School in Raleigh. The student has been working over the past year to spread the word about the rapid disappearance of amphibians in North Carolina and around the world.
Worldwide, nearly one-third of the world’s nearly 6,897 amphibian species are threatened with extinction and 200 species have completely disappeared since the late 1970’s. North Carolina is considered one of the world’s amphibian biodiversity hotspots. In particular, the state boasts at least 60 different salamander species, including the threatened Southern Gray-cheeked Salamander and Red-Legged Salamander.
The governor’s choice of April 28 coincides with worldwide events planned for the day, which will be the fourth-annual Save the Frogs Day.
Conservation groups are hailing an agreement with the U.S. Forest Service that they say will protect an area of rare old-growth forest from logging near Franklin in the Nantahala National Forest.
The Southern Environmental Law Center had appealed a logging proposal, called the Haystack project, on behalf of the Western North Carolina Alliance, Wild South and the Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition. The groups said original plans for the timber sale would have cut nearly 50 acres of old growth forest — one of the rarest habitats in North Carolina forests. The groups also raised concerns that construction of logging roads on steep and unstable mountain slopes could pose landslide risks and threaten mountain waterways.
Under a settlement finalized last week, the Nantahala Ranger District agreed to abandon two sections of the Haystack project containing trees that are 100 to 200 years old. The Forest Service also addressed the groups’ concerns about building roads on steep terrain by scaling back the length of a planned new road, which will reduce the project’s long-term footprint in the forest, according to a recent news release.
“Old-growth forests in the mountains of North Carolina provide important habitat for a variety of wildlife and plant life, but they are rare,” said Amelia Burnette, staff attorney with the forest coalition. “We commend the Forest Service for working with us to protect this significant resource.”
Great Smoky Mountains National Park got an early Holiday gift on Dec. 14 when the Friends of the Smokies officially transferred 20 acres of new land to the national park.
The land lies along Soak Ash Creek in the Pittman Center, Tenn., community just east of Gatlinburg.
The Friends purchased the tract at auction in the summer of 2010 at a cost of $775,500, sparing the park from encroaching private development.
“We had been interested in acquiring that property for many years if it ever came on the market because it is surrounded by park land on three sides and is ripe for development,” Park Superintendent Dale Ditmanson said. “We are very happy to be able to prevent potentially intensive development right on the park’s boundary, and it also protects an intact wetland.”
The park, as part of the gift, also inherited a five-bedroom house that it intends to make available to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. The house includes a large conference space which might host some park field trips when foul weather forces participants indoors.
The annual “Picnics in Pittman for the Park” at the Emerts Cove home raised more than $500,000, which became the core of the Friends’ purchase price. Other significant support included a $25,000 grant from the Foothills Land Conservancy.
If you want to know which roads are closed because of weather conditions in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the easiest way is to now get updates via Twitter.
Those without a Twitter account who wish to be notified of the status of the park’s four most popular roads — including Newfound Gap (U.S. 441) between Cherokee and Gatlinburg — can opt to get text messages to their cell phones by texting: follow smokiesroadsnps to 40404.
To stop receiving the text message alerts, text stop smokiesroadsnps to the same number. Keep in mind that if you subscribe by this method, the Twitter server may stop sending updates to you if they get an “undeliverable” response, such as your phone being off or out of area when an update is posted.
Standard text rates will apply.
Anyone having a Twitter account can go an extra step and choose to have updates set to them by going to the site listed above and clicking the “follow” button to see the updates on their own account page and receive the notifications in the manner they specify.
In addition to notifications of winter road conditions, park officials plan to notify travelers throughout the year of road openings and closings due to rock slides, fallen trees and accidents.
Audubon North Carolina has put out a new edition of Important Bird Areas of North Carolina, a full-color publication with detailed descriptions of North Carolina’s most critical bird habitats.
The book, available online at www.ncaudubonblog.org, features 96 sites comprising nearly 4.9 million acres. Important Bird Areas, or IBAs, provide essential habitat for one or more species of birds at some time during their annual cycle, including breeding, migration, and wintering periods. Well-known North Carolina IBAs include iconic landmarks such as Grandfather Mountain and Cape Lookout National Seashore.
“The IBA program is a wonderful tool for highlighting North Carolina’s ecologically significant habitats and locations,” said Curtis Smalling, Mountain Program manager for Audubon North Carolina. “IBAs provide so much more than just prime bird habitat. These special landscapes also provide clean drinking water, healthy populations of other species, and in many cases, special opportunities for people to connect to nature through recreation, education and engagement.”
Locally, the Highlands-Cashiers plateau is designated as an Important Bird Area, marking the southern limit for a number of high priority species such as Canada Warbler, Veery, and Brown Creeper. Various partners, including the Highlands Plateau Audubon Society, are working to protect and manage this high elevation ecosystem. Challenges such a the invasive Hemlock Wooly Adelgid, fragmentation of the forest and air quality threaten this special site.
To raise awareness about the state’s IBAs, including the Highlands plateau, the Audubon North Carolina will design a social media campaign around an IBA every month. Hundreds of dedicated volunteer birders and Audubon chapter members assisted with gathering data for the new edition, by surveying Important Bird Areas, conducting species specific surveys and research and participating in longstanding censuses like the Christmas Bird Count.
Audubon North Carolina is distributing the publication in book and CD form to North Carolina land conservation agencies so they can utilize the information as they set priorities for public and private land conservation projects.
Gorges State Park is sponsoring a free, guided hike on New Year’s Day. This is a part of First Day Hikes, a national initiative that offers a great way to get outside, exercise, enjoy nature and welcome the New Year with friends and family.
“First Day Hikes are a great way to cure cabin fever and burn off those extra holiday calories by starting off the New Year with an invigorating walk or hike in one of our beautiful state parks,” said Lewis Ledford, N.C. State Parks director.
The 1.5-mile hike will take place Jan. 1 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., departing from the Grassy Ridge Trail Head in Sapphire. You’ll need a light lunch or snack.
828.966.9099 or www.ncparks.gov.
Feeling sprightly in the New Year? Then hit the trails in the Tsali National Forest Recreation Area Jan. 7 with an 8k, 30k or 50k option in the annual Frosty Foot race.
This is a world famous, technical yet serene, trail system along the shoreline of Fontana Lake right on the Swain-Graham countylines.
The race is being sponsored by Foot Rx of Asheville; proceeds will help benefit Friends of the Mountains to Sea Trail. The races will occur rain or shine, though the director is reserving the right to shorten them or postpone them if the weather turns really nasty.
To register, visit www.tsalifrostyfoot.com.
The walking trail at Lake Junaluska Conference and Retreat Center is getting longer thanks to a new one-half mile extension on the lake’s south side.
Lake Junaluska is adding the new section of trail along South Lakeshore Drive, just south of the footbridge to the intersection of Hickory Hill and U.S. 19.
The addition is being added to the trail’s upper loop, lengthening it to 1.9 miles. The trail’s bottom loop is 2.4 miles. Combined, the two loops make for a 4.3-mile path around the 200-acre lake.
The new path will be made of packed gravel, said Buddy Young, director of Assembly Public Works.
The trails, which are free and open to the public, are popular among runners, walkers, dog walkers and those pushing strollers.
The project, which should be finished in a week or two, costs about $61,000 and is being funded by the Lake Junaluska Associates, a fundraising group that supports Lake Junaluska projects and programs.
If you are in Jackson and Swain counties, it’s time to sign up for the N.C. Cooperative Extension Service’s Master Gardener program.
Applications are required no later than Thursday Jan. 26. Classes will be held at the Swain Extension Center every Thursday morning for three months from 8:30 a.m. until noon, tentatively set to begin Feb. 2.
The course fee is $95, which includes a manual and weekly handouts.
Class participants receive 40 hours of training in subjects including: bulbs, vegetables, fruits, herbs, berries, pruning, grafting, native plants, organic gardening and disease.
The deal with the state is that participants return a like number of hours in volunteer service.
828.586.4009 or 828.488.3848.
Scott Nicholson will visit City Lights Bookstore to present and sign his three latest horror novels: Chronic Fear, Liquid Fear and his short story collection, Monster Ink, at 6p.m. on Dec. 21.
Nicholson lives in Western North Carolina and is the author of more than a dozen novels and 70 short stories, as well as six screenplays, four children’s books, and three comic book series. His novel The Red Church was a finalist for the Bram Stoker Award and an alternate selection of the Mystery Guild.
He also has collaborated with bestselling author J.R. Rain on several paranormal novels. He has served with the Mystery Writers of America, the Horror Writers Association, and International Thriller Writers. A former journalist, radio broadcaster, and musician, Nicholson won three North Carolina Press Association awards.
828.586.9499.
The Waynesville Parks and Recreation Department will offer art classes at the Old Armory Recreation Center beginning in January.
There will be three different classes — drawing, watercolor and painting.
The drawing class will meet the first and third Tuesday of January and February from 10 a.m. to noon. The basics of drawing — such as line, perspective and shading — will make up the bulk of the class. Each class is $15.
Subjects covered in the watercolor class will include landscapes, still life and streetscapes. Meeting times are 1 to 3 p.m. the first and third Tuesday of January and February. The cost is $20 per class.
The painting class covers the basics of acrylics and oil paint, including the use of paints and color mixing, brushes and cleaning of the brush. Various subjects will be painted. The class will meet the first and third Tuesday of January and February from 6 to 8 p.m.
All classes will meet at the Old Armory Recreation Center, and students in each class are responsible for providing their own supplies.
828.456.9918 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
Harrah’s Cherokee Casino and Hotel will celebrate the New Year with a burlesque show. The evening will feature live entertainment at multiple locations throughout the casino and hotel. Acts include Bella Electric Strings, who will perform from 6 to 10 p.m. in the hotel lobby, and The Vinyl Brothers Big Band, who will take to the stage at 8 p.m. in the casino. At 9 p.m., the casino transforms into burlesque celebration with a variety of performances.
Guests can also take part in New Year’s Eve festivities in Essence Lounge beginning at 6:30 p.m. The band, Final Say, will kick off the night.
Essence will have a cover charge, starting at $20. However, New Year’s Eve packages are also available; $99 will reserve a table for two and feature a bottle of champagne, party favor package and a $15 food credit for any outlet in the food court. Additional guests can be added for $20 per person. Attendees can reserve a table in the Essence Lounge by calling 1.800.Caesars.
Haywood Community College recently announced the winners of the school’s first photo contest.
HCC student Samantha Faust’s “Learning to Swim” won first place. “Safe at Home,” by HCC Adult Education instructor Karma Shuford, was the second-place winner, and Phillip Turner, HCC Lead Computer Technician, took third place with “Sunset at the Lake.” People’s Choice award went to HCC student Kira Farrington for “Dead End.”
The photo contest was open to all HCC faculty members, staff, students, alumni and board members. The college employees and students as well as members of the community could vote for the People’s Choice winner. The college’s library and website will display the winning artwork for one year.
The HCC Foundation sponsored the photo contest. First place received $250, and second and third place received $50, and People’s Choice winner won $150.
“The HCC Foundation was please to support this new initiative on campus,” said HCC Director of Institutional Advancement Sherri Myers. “The goal was to bring together the people of the community and the college.”
The Great Smoky Mountains Railroad will ring in the New Year with a dinner and dance Dec. 31.
As the train rolls down the track, attendees can partake in an evening of live music, dancing and dining.
The evening will begin with a reception at 7:45 p.m. in the Smoky Mountain Trains Museum with a selection of beer, wine and mixed drinks as well as an array of hors d’oeuvres, including tiger shrimp with cocktail sauce, steak and roasted pepper skewers and fruit covered in chocolate.
Boarding will promptly begin at 8:45 p.m., and the train will depart from the Bryson City depot at 9 p.m. The trip will feature a three-course dinner on a vintage dining car at the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad, party favors and a champagne toast to 2012.
Alias Smith and Jones, an Atlanta-based acoustic guitar/vocal duo, will be the featured entertainment for the evening.
The event is open only to adults, 21 and over. Dinner train tickets are $135 per person (plus tax and gratuity). Advanced reservations and 72-hour cancellation notice are required. Call the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad for dress code information.
800.872.4681 or www.gsmr.com.
The Moody Blues will perform at Harrah’s Cherokee Casino and Hotel on March 31 as part of their 32-city U.S. tour in 2012.
The tour will celebrate the 45th anniversary of their album “Days of Future Passed,” and will kick off next March 11 at Hard Rock Hotel in Hollywood, Florida and continue through April 21, ending in Niagara Falls.
The band’s history spans four decades, during which they sold more than 70 million albums worldwide and received 14 platinum and gold discs. Their set list includes: “Nights In White Satin,” “Tuesday Afternoon,” “Isn’t Life Strange,” “I’m Just A Singer (In A Rock And Roll Band),” and “I Know You’re Out There Somewhere.”
“The rockers played a set that reminded the sold-out Music Hall why (The Moody Blues are) one of the most important rock acts to ever come out of the U.K.,” wrote the New York Times.
Tickets are currently on sale at ticketmaster.com, and prices range from $45 to $75.
800.745.3000.
The Freight Hoppers, a nationally known string band, will play at Jack of the Wood in Asheville at 11 p.m., Jan 14.
Based out of the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina, The Freight Hoppers perform old-time southern music and are influenced by string bands from the 1920s and 30s. The band has been played at festivals and in music halls since signing with Rounder Records in 1996.
Its’ members include fiddler David Bass, banjo player and vocalist Frank Lee, bassist Bradley Adams, and guitarist and singer Isaac Deal.
Twilite Broadcaster will open the show at 8 p.m. and tickets are $8.
The Soweto Gospel Choir will fill the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium with music at 4 p.m. on Jan. 29.
Part of the Asheville Bravo Concerts series, Soweto Gospel Choir specializes in African Gospel music.
Formed 10 years ago, Soweto Gospel Choir is from South Africa and is comprised of singers from churches in and around Soweto. Accompanied by a 4-piece band and percussion section, the group performs both traditional and contemporary music in six of South Africa’s 11 official languages.
Two-time Grammy award winners, the choir has toured around the world, performing on nearly every continent, and with other musicians like Bono, Jimmy Cliff, Josh Groben, Aretha Franklin and Robert Plant.
In 2009, the group became the first South African artists to perform at the Academy Awards when they sang “Down to Earth,” their award-winning song from the Disney film “Wall-E.”
“Soweto Gospel Choir takes this type of performance to a whole new level. It will surely be a treat for any age and musical taste,” said Asheville Bravo Concerts’ Executive Director Tracey Johnston-Crum.
Tickets for Soweto Gospel Choir’s Jan. 29 performance at the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium are $15 to $60, and student tickets are half-price.
828.225.5887 or www.ashevillebravoconcerts.org.
Phyllis Jarvinen of Sylva will demonstrate and teach a mini-workshop on book arts and book binding at the Art League of the Smokies meeting Jan. 6.
The workshop will start at 6:15 p.m. in the lobby of Swain County Center for the Arts in Bryson City.
Participants will follow the step-by-step process to make a slim hardbound book during this program. Participants can bring old maps, pretty papers or photos to use for endsheets or covers if desired. The event is free and open to the public.
Jarvinen is an award-winning artist with exhibitions at Western Carolina University and the Oconaluftee Institute for Cultural Arts this past year. She will head to Florida next year to serve as artist in residence at the Everglades National Park.
828.488.7843.
Western Carolina University will hold a stained glass course every Thursday from 6 to 9 p.m. from Jan. 12 through Feb. 9.
The class is for beginning through advanced-level students and will be taught by Moya O’Neal, a stained glass artist with more than 20 years experience.
The course will follow the Tiffany method of stained glass, by which each piece of glass is wrapped in copper foil and then soldered. Participants will learn safety; proper cutting, foiling and soldering techniques; and simple metal framing. By the end of the course, each student will have completed a project in plain glass and a small panel in colored glass.
The class, offered through WCU’s Division of Educational Outreach, costs $85 and will be held in the Cordelia Camp building’s south lobby. Students should bring safety glasses, pen, pencil, felt-tipped pen, notepaper, cotton gloves, adhesive bandages and a 12-inch-by-12-inch box to carry glass and tools. All other tools and supplies will be provided.
Registration for the class is required.
828.227.7397 or www.learn.wcu.edu.
Another Christmas tragedy appeared on the horizon with the arrival of our Christmas tree. I have often thought the holiday season would best begin if it didn’t start with this most terrifying event. I don’t believe in the recreational use of drugs but would condone occasional consumption prior to this annual ordeal.
First comes the tree selection. Living in an area where firs are grown commercially, one would think we were one up on people residing in Orlando or Pittsburgh. The opposite is true; more choices more problems. My wife, perfectionist that she is, won’t allow anything but a flawlessly shaped cone to enter the house. No holes, extra branches, twisted limbs or a trunk that is anything but 180 degrees vertical. I have finally learned how to avoid this particular problem. I have a best friend deliver one from his Christmas tree farm. She can’t argue with him.
If choosing the right fir can make me reach for nitroglycerin, putting the chosen one in the stand will be the major contributing factor to my fourth bypass surgery. Christmas tree stands are much like ex-wives; they cost too much, never work, can’t do what you want them to, and never cease taking delight in seeing a grown man cry. My fondest dream is the creation of a virtual Christmas tree. One I can decorate on my computer and then laser it into the appropriate place.
That’s another major headache — where to put the smelly, needle-dropping mess. Why don’t architects design houses that a tree will fit into? If you haven’t gone to the liquor cabinet by now, the next operation will guarantee the need for a double — putting on the lights.
I have often wondered whose idea it was to use lights. I think it was some feminist group who love to see grown men grovel and cry. The real idiots are those men who try to use last year’s lights. I am convinced that a light grinch exists who goes from house to house beginning the day after Christmas. The same Grinch who makes fruit cakes. Somehow (s)he sneaks into basements and quietly tangles strands of lights which were carefully rolled up and, to add insult to injury, steals one bulb from each strand. Of course the man who buys new ones is no better off. I am convinced that light strands are boxed by inebriated Italian cooks. Assuming that you have them properly aligned, it is best to test them. Can you remember any time five strands of lights actually worked simultaneously?
By now a sane person has finished off most of a fifth. The dog is hiding under the neighbor’s house, the kids are calling 911 and your wife is thinking her mother was right when she suggested computer dating or a nunnery instead of accepting your marriage proposal. About this time I usually think of converting to one of the stricter Islamic religions in hopes that it bans all such splash and glitter in its most important religious event*. Realizing that most such faiths forbid the use of alcohol I continue my rock-rolling task and commence placing the lights on the green ogre.
Several theories exist which propound the politically correct way to string the tree. A few of the more popular ones are top down, bottom up, vertical rows, in and out and of course my favorite, helter skelter. Whichever method you choose will always result in the same problem. The last plug is on the opposite side of the tree from the electric receptacle and you don’t have another extension cord. No problem. We just move the tree from its architecturally incorrect place. Success seems just over the horizon until the lights are joyously plugged in by your youngest. Someone bought those infernal blinking lights! Time for another double.
By now most men have retired to the opposite side of the room, taken up the fetal position and started sucking their thumbs. For the few that have made it beyond this far comes the glorious hanging of balls. Another of nature’s great mysteries presents itself. Where did all the hangars go that you so carefully packed each ball with just 51 weeks before? It may be a genetically deformed version of the light grinch, but I truly believe that this phenomenon is something akin to the Bermuda Triangle. Enough of Christmas tree balls. They are a novel for another time. Let it be said that everything from a golf shoe to a Taco Bell Chihuahua is hung from our fir. Now the bottle is empty and a second cracked open.
Just three more tasks: tinsel, star and tree skirt. As many theories abound concerning appropriate tinsel hanging as light placement. Once again you have the single strand placement advocates, the several at a time underhand toss people, and the two-handed glob throwing radicals. Of course one has to consider whether to implement the “little is better theory” or the “more the merrier plan.” No matter what the choice, one can be assured most of this rejected aluminum foil will end up in the floor and will be around when the Easter bunny comes. Hmm. I had never thought how much tinsel looks like that colored stuff put in Easter baskets.
The crowning moment has now come; the star. Some prefer a lighted version, but by now my tree is violating all fire codes so the plain star is chosen. If everything has proceeded accordingly I have had about two shots of the second bottle and am convinced that I can stand one legged on a barstool while holding the wall and perfectly place the real symbol of Christmas. I won’t bore you with the details. As I stumble to my feet and pick up the chair, my wife dryly comments that the tree looks cute lying on the floor and now she won’t have to worry about the kids pulling it over on themselves.
After carefully wiring the tree to the mantle, an overhead light and a screw placed in the wall, my wife puts the skirt under the tree. Tree skirts serve no apparent function other than to create havoc every time you need to water the damn tree. I believe mothers hand these down to daughters as a curse. My thinking is that old white sheets are best as long as they haven’t been used too often as dropcloths for home painting projects. (Another story for another time.)
Eureka! A skirt! If only someone had told me that Christmas trees are female. Next year will be different. First thing I’m going to do is burn my friend’s Christmas tree farm.
•••
Post Script. A typical Monday at the office has just ended. I sit on the couch with a glass of wine, turn on my computer and double click the AOL button. She is running around the house trying to ready for our Christmas party just three days away. Supper is in the crockpot. Her best friend drops in for a quick drink. Of course a tree viewing is in order. From across the room I watch as lights are plugged in. A blood curdling yell disgorges from my wife’s mouth: “The lights won’t work.”
These words immediately send cold chills running down my spine. I believe that no other phrase could evoke the fear and trepidation that I begin to experience. “Please God, let the lights come on.” Genesis and the story of the first days of the world came to mind. Once again I quietly and fervently pray that He would let there be light. Alas, such was not the case.
As fate would have it, my wife’s younger sister arrives on the scene. You know her. The one who works at the Christmas shop. She of Christmas tree knowledge and the patience of Job. (I often wonder if they are truly of the same gene pool.) A long explanation of never putting more than three strands on one switch, never mixing and matching different lights and, of all things, how fuses work is mockingly given and contritely received.
I have always considered myself a quick learner. It only takes driving a screwdriver into two knuckles to decide that a $3.95 set of lights was not worth the effort to repair. The unthinkable replacement of the dead set is a better fate. Into the tree I go. I tell my wife where my last will and testament is and that I have signed a donor card and a living will.
Three minutes later, with evergreen scratches covering my arms, needles in my mouth and sap covering my hands, I escape the tree with the dead strand. No rest for the weary though. A quick survey of the tree by my lovely is made. From out of no where she produces the dreaded replacement set. Reminding her of my burial requests I dive back into the forest.
I have never believed in good or bad fortune, but somehow my lucky light must have been shining on this tree. In less than two minutes I replace the darkened set and am sitting on the floor with plug in hand. I think to myself, maybe I shouldn’t press my luck. What if I plug it in and nothing but a black hole appears? Naw, it’s my lucky day. Quickly I insert the plug into the receptacle. Yes!! I high five the dog and the kids. God is undeservedly smiling on me. Evidently he has decided I have been punished enough for one Christmas.
As I sit on the couch pounding out this story on my Toshiba lap top I lift my humble head and tearfully stare across the living room floor. There stands the most beautiful tree in the whole world. My wife’s Christmas tree.
•••
Post post script. It is now two years since I revealed the terrible horrors you have just read. Once again I’m sitting on the couch three days before the “Big Xmas Party”. Lucky me — I don’t have to wander into that terrible forest again. Most people wouldn’t have gone to the extremes I did to escape this punishment. How does back surgery sound? Yes sir it works wonders. Not suffering excruciating back pain every time you breathe is only secondary. The good news is your surgeon repeatedly telling you in front of the lovely: “ FOR THE NEXT MONTH DON’T LIFT ANYTHING HEAVIER THAN FIVE POUNDS, DON’T BEND, TWIST OR TURN AND USE PAIN MEDICATION AS NEEDED.”
Scheduling this surgery did take some doing. Most patients have to wait six weeks to see a doctor and then another month to get scheduled. Christmas had slipped up on me and I didn’t have this long to wait. It so happens my brother lives next door to this neurosurgeon who plays bad poker and I guess you can figure out the rest. One month after the MRI revealed a herniated disc, I was on the operating table. Some of you might think I went to extremes to avoid the tree. You haven’t heard anything yet. Next year I’m thinking of confessing to being Jack the Ripper.
It is 2011 some 12 years after the first episode in this saga and the merriest of all seasons is upon us — like a white sheet pulled over a corpse. Age does have its benefits. My lovely hasn’t required that hallowed of all hallowed icons, THE CHRISTMAS TREE, for almost 5 years. Of course each Xmas party we go to brings the sardonic “I know we don’t need a tree, but doesn’t that one look beautiful?” Saturday night almost brought a good marriage to a bad end. Fate would have it that we were invited to my friend’s house who supplied the trees for many years. A chef’s dinner was being served — at least I would die on a full stomach. We had barely pulled into the drive on Scenic Circle when it began — “Whee, look at the trees — and one is on the outside porch!” I mumbled under my breath, “if I owned a tree farm we would have one on the porch too, but I am a lawyer who has had three open heart surgeries, four stents, three hip replacements, two back surgeries, gall bladder surgery, two knee surgeries and a partridge in a damned old Christmas tree.” Fortunately the divine one didn’t hear me. The night went well enough — a good merlot makes all things merrier and Carolina won a close basketball game. As we drove down the street towards our treeless home the bell rang on the first round of a marriage ending argument — “we could move the couch, tie up the dog, move the TV and put up a little tree.” I reached for the nitro hoping that this would stop the pain — not in my chest, but in my head. She immediately fell for the ruse. “Honey, I knew it would be too much for you. We can do without again.” And so another Christmas will pass without the need of a divorce attorney and sans tree.
(Gavin Brown is an attorney and mayor of Waynesville.)
North Carolina will receive a $69.9 million grant award from the federal Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge fund to support early childhood education throughout the state.
“This award is outstanding news for our children, families and educators across North Carolina,” said U.S. Rep. Heath Shuler, D-Waynesville. “Investing in high-quality early education is one of the most important steps we can take to put our children on the path to success in school and in life.
Thirty-five states developed plans to increase access to high-quality early education programs. North Carolina was one of nine states to be selected for an award.
In November, Rep. Shuler and five other members of the North Carolina Congressional Delegation sent a letter to the Secretary of Education and the Secretary of Health and Human Services in strong support of North Carolina’s grant application for the Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge.
The Waynesville Parks and Recreation Department will offer swim lessons in January, February and March.
The lessons will take place at the Waynesville Recreation Center:
• January lessons: Level one swim lessons from 4-4:30 p.m., level two from 5-5:30 p.m. and level 3 and 4 from 4:30-5 p.m. Sign up begins Dec. 12.
• February lessons: Level one from 4:30-5 p.m. and level 2 from 4-4:30 p.m. Sign up begins Jan. 23.
• March lessons: level on from 4-4:30 p.m. and level two from 4:30-5 p.m. Sign up begins Feb. 20.
All lessons take place Monday through Thursday. The cost is $30 per person for members of the Waynesville Recreation Center, or $35 for non-members.
828.456.2030 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
After a five-week search, Western Carolina University has found its new director of athletics.
Randy Eaton, former senior associate director of athletics at the University of Maryland, was announced as the new director at a press conference Wednesday. Eaton will earn $160,000 a year.
“What impresses me most about Randy is his unwavering commitment to the student-athlete and the fact that he understands that the word `student' is the most important part of that hyphenated term,” said Western Carolina Chancellor David O. Belcher, in a news release. “That’s not to say that Randy does not want success on the fields and courts of play, because he shares the same expectations of excellence that I have for all of our sports teams. He has a passion for winning, and for winning the right way.”
Eaton, who will start effective Dec. 14, has acted as senior associate director of athletics at the University of Maryland and the athletics department’s chief financial officer since June 2008. He oversaw a $60 million annual operating budget and served as interim athletic director at Maryland in 2010.
He also has held positions at the University of Houston, Texas A&M University, East Tennessee State University, Ohio State University and the University of Texas at San Antonio and with the Ohio Glory of World League Football.
Winter Light
So much light in what we call the dark
of the year, a flashing and glittering
of light …
Should it surprise us, having known the holes
of darkness in the longest days?
— William Bronk, “A Bright Day in December” from The World, The Wordless (1964).
On Lower Lands Creek it has been decreed that winter starts with the first snowy or sleety day in November (often the 12) and extends, with interludes, until the first truly spring-like series of days in late March.
Day by day winter narrows life down, dulling senses with dark cold or sharpening with mere light. Elsewhere barrenness and the promise of death are not neglected … but herein our subject is illumination and awareness. Except at sunrise and sunset or before an electric storm, winter light here in the southern mountains is plain — never pea green as in spring and early summer and never tan-yellow or faded rose as in late summer and fall.
In this plain light we see edges, shapes and basic colors: twigs and branches, stakes and posts, rusty wire and rotting string, thin blue shadows on snow, brown paths curving beside lichen encrusted stone walls, and the slow fire of moss. Winter provides time enough (before we no longer have the light) to pay closer attention to the daily textures and occasional singularities of this often dark but sometimes bright world we call home.
After the summer haze and the soft tones of autumn, we’re not always confronted by gloom. Instead, we are awakened to windowpanes and lakes that hold steady images of mountains without end transfixed by plain winter light. Pines on the far ridge stand cleanly outlined. Some part of the effect, of course, is that there is less moisture this time of the year. We do see more clearly in cold dry air — so much so that distant objects seem near. You will have noticed how close summer ridges are when blanketed with lingering snow? But once it has melted, they will recede.
That’s the semi-scientific version. Not a few reliable observers — backcountry rangers, ginseng enthusiasts, coon hunters who keep computer records for any movement greater than three feet and whether the moon was shining, and others who get out and about — have reported mountains moving around on their own when light turns silver blue and crisp air is electrically charged. Thunderhead is said to have wanderlust. High Rocks went missing for a week and then reappeared one Tuesday morning. Sharp Top disappeared Thanksgiving morning and hasn’t been heard from since.
After a lifetime as a watercolorist, my wife has an uncanny sense of the interrelationships of colors observed in a landscape. For her there is almost no pure white light … not even in winter.
“Look,” she said pointing southward from a high ridge, “at the lavender shadows crossing that far mountainside. See how the fluffy clouds way up there are reflecting some portion of light from the sun that’s about to set out there in the west. Winter sunshine is tricky business.”
“Winter sunshine is tricky business?” I repeated.
“Tricky business,” she replied.
George Ellison wrote the biographical introductions for the reissues of two Appalachian classics: Horace Kephart’s Our Southern Highlanders and James Mooney’s History, Myths, and Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees. In June 2005, a selection of his Back Then columns was published by The History Press in Charleston as Mountain Passages: Natural and Cultural History of Western North Carolina and the Great Smoky Mountains. Readers can contact him at P.O. Box 1262, Bryson City, N.C., 28713, or at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
